The Legend of Thrawn
by MissKitsune08
Summary: After the galaxy finally laid down its weapons after more than twenty years of constant conflict, Grand Admiral Pellaeon, Supreme Commander of the Imperial Remnant, receives a coded communique from a man who introduces himself as Admiral Voss Parck, steward of the Empire of the Hand. GEN. A stand-alone fic set in Legends. Written for Thrawn Appreciation Week, Jan. 8 Prompt: Regrets


**Title: The Legend of Thrawn**

Summary: After the galaxy finally laid down its weapons after more than twenty years of constant conflict, Grand Admiral Pellaeon, Supreme Commander of the Imperial Remnant, receives a coded communique from a man who introduces himself as Admiral Voss Parck, steward of the Empire of the Hand. GEN. A stand-alone fic set in Legends.

 **Written for Thrawn Appreciation Week, Jan. 8 Prompt: Regrets. You have been warned.**

Author's Note:

Too many admirals, not enough ensigns. I apologize if the form of address is too confusing. Trivia: In _Dark Tide II: Ruin_ , it is explicitly mentioned that Pellaeon wears the white uniform of a grand admiral, suggesting he received promotion somewhere between 19–25ABY, but he is described only as an admiral throughout the whole book. In fact, he isn't described as a grand admiral until _Destiny's Way & Force Heretic Trilogy _(28ABY). An error? A mistake? Anyway, I'm using it!

* * *

After the peace treaty with the New Republic had been signed, after the galaxy finally laid down its weapons after more than twenty years of constant conflict, and after life finally returned back to normal—enough that he actually started considering retirement and thereby leaving the fate of the Empire to the next generation—Grand Admiral Gilad Pellaeon received a coded communique from a man who had introduced himself as Admiral Voss Parck, steward of the Empire of the Hand.

The same Voss Parck who had discovered Grand Admiral Thrawn and who had him brought directly to the Emperor, eventually following his finding into the Unknown Regions after being demoted down to Commander. He had served as the first officer to Captain Dagon Niriz, who had happened to be at the wrong time and the wrong place when the Emperor's patience for then Admiral Thrawn's antics in the Imperial Court finally ran out, assigning him with the task of mapping the uncharted space.

Or so it had seemed at that time.

Now, after Imperial Intelligence had finally gotten their hands on the classified reports which Jedi Master Luke Skywalker and his wife, Mara Jade Skywalker, the former Emperor's Hand, had presented to the New Republic government, Pellaeon knew there was more to this Voss Parck than met the eye.

However, there was still the question as to why the renegade admiral had waited for more than a decade before making contact with the Empire proper, remaining in hiding and observing them from the shadows, watching as Bastion's location moved from planet to planet until the capital finally settled down on Sartinaynian in the Braxant sector located in the Outer Rim Territories.

Why now, after so many years?

And more importantly, what was so significant that he had to tell Pellaeon in person, going as far as agreeing to Pellaeon's terms to come the _Chimaera_ alone in a personal shuttle? If Pellaeon so wished, he could have simply ordered to have him blasted off the universe, a fate reserved for deserters and traitors.

Nevertheless, Admiral Parck stood true to his word and came alone—and at any rate, after signing the Bastion Accords, Pellaeon was hardly in a position to charge anyone with high treason to the Empire.

There was only one other person, the pilot, who had remained onboard, declining Captain Ardiff's offer of refreshment over the comm. Presumably he would stay to guard the shuttle and scan the docking bay to prevent the _Chimaera_ 's technicians from planting a tracking device on the ship.

A standard practice.

Captain Ardiff came to greet Admiral Parck personally and took him to Pellaeon's office, giving them both a sharp salute upon his dismissal. Later Pellaeon would ask the _Chimaera_ 's young captain about his impression of the renegade, a practice Pellaeon had adopted from Grand Admiral Thrawn.

Now, there was this matter of utmost importance, as Admiral Parck had phrased it in the coded communique which somehow managed to reach Pellaeon's private comm frequency, suggesting a serious breach in security protocols. Imperial Intelligence would not be happy to hear that their next-generation encoding, their source of pride and joy, was apparently as vulnerable to an expert slicer as the diplomatic protocols of the New Republic.

There was an awkward silence after Captain Ardiff had left; the two men were hesitantly looking at each other, wondering whether they should salute to each other or simply shake hands. Pellaeon held the higher rank, but Parck did not fall under his authority, and in the end they decided for an informal salute, with Parck raising his arm first as befitting the lower rank, and Pellaeon returning the salute with a grave nod, gesturing the other admiral to take a seat reserved for guests.

"I suppose you must think of me as a traitor, Grand Admiral," Parck began, accepting Pellaeon's offer to sit down. "Since I've never returned back into active service, and I've never offered you a helping hand in the fight against the Rebellion."

Pellaeon sagged down into his command chair, resting his back against the padding, and stroked his mustache in thought.

"A traitor?" He shook his head.

"I've signed the peace treaty with the New Republic, Admiral Parck," he said in a bittersweet tone. "In the eyes of the loyalists, that makes _me_ into a traitor. The Moff Council even promoted me to a grand admiral for my peace initiative as a gesture of good will—or, if you prefer to call things by their true names, to spit in the face of a traitor."

The other admiral regarded him for a moment.

"Then they are fools." Parck declared resolutely. "You heart has always been beating for the Empire, Grand Admiral Pellaeon, which is why Grand Admiral Thrawn chose you as his second-in-command for the campaign to re-unite the Core."

"Was it?" Pellaeon wondered, his eyes flickering down to the grand admiral's insignia on the pristine white uniform.

"I wouldn't know… Lately I've been thinking…" He fell silent for a moment. "And in any case, a military faction which has been reduced to a mere eight sectors has no need for a grand admiral. I'd prefer if you addressed me simply as Admiral Pellaeon, please."

The old wound which Moff Disra, Major Tierce, and the con artist Flim re-opened was still raw. Pulsing.

Becoming slowly re-infected.

Grand Admiral Thrawn's resurrection from the dead might have been exposed as a sham, but unfortunately it didn't help allay his doubts, _fears_ , whether Pellaeon had ever been more to his former alien commander than a mere disposable front-line soldier.

Or worse.

That Pellaeon _had_ been more, that Grand Admiral Thrawn had truly seen him as his second-in-command, his protégé, perhaps even his own successor, and that it was _Pellaeon's_ own actions which had brought the Empire down to its knees, becoming a mere dot at the edge of the galactic map.

That he had failed Grand Admiral Thrawn.

Frankly, Pellaeon didn't know which of his nightmares scared him the most.

"Admiral Pellaeon."

Parck's firm voice helped him to bring his mind back to the matter at hand.

"Believe me or not, I know _exactly_ what you are going through for the very reason that I've been suffering from my own share of blame, doubts, and self-loathing upon realizing that Grand Admiral Thrawn had been dead all these years."

There, Parck's voice faltered.

"Thinking that perhaps the former Emperor's Hand was right and I've become truly … delusional." A small shudder escaped him. "Naturally, I heard the rumors of Grand Admiral Thrawn being killed over Bilbringi, but I dismissed them because I genuinely believed that he would return in exactly ten years after his supposed death. Especially after learning he had been assassinated by his Noghri bodyguard. Ridiculous, right?"

Parck stifled a laugh.

"And he would return… In the form of his own clone whose growth must have been triggered by the news of his death being announced by the Imperial authorities. Only upon discovering the hidden chamber beneath the fortress, upon seeing the clone's lifeless body with my very own eyes, only then did I realize that this must have been his plan B in the event of his own death, the plan he didn't want us to know because we wouldn't have accepted the clone as his true heir. And I freely confess, Admiral Pellaeon, at that moment, I felt like biggest damn idiot in the entire universe."

Pellaeon couldn't help but feel sorry for the other admiral.

Even if he didn't see Grand Admiral Thrawn die in front of his eyes, Pellaeon couldn't imagine simply carrying on upon hearing the news of his death without even trying to find out what happened, dismissing it as a mere … what, exactly, New Republic propaganda? Imperial mystification? One of Grand Admiral Thrawn's grand schemes?

For more than a decade.

"'I congratulate you all on your cleverness. You are indeed the true heirs to Thrawn's genius and military might,' the former Emperor's Hand told me during her little job interview. She was being sarcastic, of course."

Parck visibly pulled himself together.

"However, I haven't come here to compare my own feeling of failure with yours, Admiral Pellaeon, or to exchange stories about blaming oneself for Grand Admiral Thrawn's death. After all, it was my cousin who captained Lord Vader's ship which had crashed over Honoghr, and it was through me Grand Admiral Thrawn got to know of the Noghri's unwavering loyalty to their master," Parck continued in a strange, impersonal tone.

"I have come here to offer my services, since there is still a war to be fought before we can retire to the home for elderly where we both belong."

"War?" Pellaeon repeated in a confused tone, looking at the other man with disbelief. Could have he actually become … delusional?

"War against whom? Surely you cannot expect me to declare war with the New Republic after I've signed the Bastion Accords."

Parck shook his head.

"No. Not with the New Republic. A war against the Far Outsiders, an extra-galactic species of alien marauders who are coming with an invasion force capable of subjugating this entire galaxy. Their only goal is to cleanse the galaxy of all infidels, of all impurity, of all sentient life as we know it and replace it with their own. They cannot be reasoned with. They are brutal, merciless, and unstoppable. Their whole culture is centered on pain. They tend to glorify it, not as a motive for action but rather as a state of living. They mutilate themselves in order to become closer to their gods, insisting on using purely organic technology, believing everything mechanical to be an abomination..."

As Pellaeon listened to the long monologue delivered in the same, strangely impersonal tone, his impression ranged from doubt to skepticism, dismissing all of it as the mere babbling of a lunatic—until Admiral Parck finally pulled out a datadisc, providing him with actual proof (well, it could have been all fake, of course), intel obtained from Grand Admiral Thrawn's own people's past skirmish with these so-called Far Outsiders.

Pellaeon frowned at the date of acquisition.

"But I've been under impression that Grand Admiral Thrawn had been exiled by his own people, or so the old Fleet records say. How could he possibly have obtained a copy of the Chiss Ascendancy's top secret files after his exile? Unless, of course, the information came from rogue Chiss warriors serving the Empire of the Hand you've previously mentioned."

Empire of the Hand.

A secret military alliance consisting of castaway Imperials, renegade Chiss warriors, and major non-human civilizations native to the Unknown Regions. Humans serving together with aliens, humans mixing with aliens, and Vader knew what else.

Now while Pellaeon considered himself to be fairly open-minded Imperial, he knew the Moff Council would go crazy over the very idea. He smiled sardonically at himself, easily imagining the temper tantrum they would throw upon learning of such obscenities taking place under the Imperial emblem, especially since most of them found even the idea of shaking hands with New Republic's non-human Chief of State downright repulsive. Fortunately, by kindly presenting him with the white uniform of a grand admiral, Pellaeon no longer needed to concern himself with their antics.

"While the rogue Chiss warriors and a few other alien species serving the Empire of the Hand have indeed heard of the Far Outsiders, these files, the actual proof of their existence, have been safely stored in the secret cloning chamber below the Hand of Thrawn fortress on Nirauan. Grand Admiral Thrawn kept the files securely locked away until the clone met its untimely end."

Pellaeon was starting to understand what was the other getting at. "But then..."

"Admiral Pellaeon, do you wonder why Grand Admiral Thrawn never revealed this information beforehand?" Parck asked him. "Granted, I've been privy to more information than the rest. It would have never worked otherwise. But even I have been light years away from being aware of his plans, his goals, his grand schemes."

"He didn't trust you. _Us_. None of his men."

Parck shook his head.

"No, Admiral Pellaeon, it has never been a matter of trust." Parck spoke in a voice full of melancholy. He let out a small chuckle, but it could have been a whimper, Pellaeon supposed.

"It's very simple: the great Grand Admiral Thrawn was afraid. He feared our respective judgments in case we ever found out the truth."

Parck looked him directly in the eyes.

"We believed in him, we trusted in him, we looked up to him as a leader figure, the one worthy of our loyalty, the one worth dying for..."

Parck made a dramatic pause.

"And he had been lying to us, using the Empire for years. Grand Admiral Thrawn's loyalty has always belonged first and foremost to his people."

"So we've never been more to him than mere … stormtroopers, disposable front-line soldiers." Pellaeon said, his voice barely above a whisper, realizing that his nightmares had indeed come true.

Parck's expression softened. "No, Admiral Pellaeon, we _became_ his people. Somewhere along the way—unfortunately I do not know exactly when, hopefully nowhere near the date of acquisition—Grand Admiral Thrawn came to see us as his own."

Parck shrugged.

"But now you understand why he had been so afraid of us getting to know the truth. I believe he would have told us, eventually, once the Rebellion had been dealt with, once the Core had been re-united under a strong, central figure-head, and once we were all ready cast away our differences and face the oncoming storm."

Parck pursed his lips.

"However, not before he proved to us—and more importantly, not before he proved to _himself_ —that he had truly become a leader worthy of our trust and loyalty, not merely another Emperor Palpatine."

Pellaeon stroke his mustache in thought, contemplating the situation for a moment. "Then how do you know all this?"

"Besides these files, there was also a hand-held holoprojector with a message which would autoplay only after verifying the viewer's bioscan. His plan C, if you will. A message in which he confessed everything, and in which he asked me to open diplomatic relations with the Chiss Ascendancy since, as you have probably guessed by now, he had never been truly exiled."

Parck placed a finger on his lips, as if asking Pellaeon to keep it a secret.

Pellaeon nodded. Deep down he understood, more than anyone, for the need of Grand Admiral Thrawn's memory to remain unsullied. Especially after the fiasco with the con artist.

"However, this old, weak heart of mine couldn't have possibly handled the Defense Hierarchy and the Council of Families, so I assigned General Fel with the task. He is still young, he is fierce, and he is used to nerfshit, you see, being a farmboy at heart despite the title of an Imperial Baron bestowed upon him. If anyone can make the Chiss Ascendancy open their glowing eyes and see reason, it's Soontir Fel."

Pellaeon couldn't help barking a sharp laugh at the other admiral's choice of words.

Soontir Fel, a fellow Corellian, the former ace pilot of the TIE Fighter Corps, the poster boy of the Galactic Empire who later defected to the New Republic, joining the infamous Rogue Squadron, and who apparently somehow found his way into the Empire of the Hand's armed services instead of being summarily executed for treason.

"I've merely decided to take it a bit further to avoid making the same mistake Grand Admiral Thrawn made, the one which had ultimately cost him his life. Empire of the Hand is fully at your disposal, _Grand_ Admiral Pellaeon. You can count on us when the dark tide comes. Together we will show the galaxy that the Empire is still a force to be reckoned with."

Parck's eyes were now staring into a faraway distance, back into the days of the greatest glory of the Galactic Empire.

"He should have told us. Or at the very least he should have told _me_. Keeping secrets… _That's_ what cost him his life. And the Force help us all, Grand Admiral Pellaeon, for the Far Outsiders are real, and they are coming, whether the Moff Council, the New Republic, or even the Chiss Ascendancy want it or not. They are coming for us all."

* * *

"Do you wish to sit in the pilot's seat or the co-pilot's seat on the way back, Admiral?" The pilot, a rogue Chiss warrior named Kres'ten'tarthi, Commander of Mitth'raw'nuruodo's Household Phalanx, asked in a neutral tone as Parck entered the cockpit.

"If it's all right with you, Stent, I think I will retire to my cabin." Parck replied in a tired voice, massaging his temples with his hand.

"Do you feel unwell?" the Chiss warrior asked with concern, blue-black eyebrows furrowing a frown. "Perhaps we could stay a little longer..." he suggested diplomatically, the glowing eyes giving him a long, measuring look.

Parck shook his head dismissively. "Merely tired, that's all."

The Chiss nodded fractionally. "Then I shall perform the standard pre-flight procedures. I am fairly confident that I should be able to operate this shuttlecraft alone."

Parck gave Stent a curt nod in acknowledgment and walked over to the cabin suite located at the aft of the shuttle, sat down on the couch, unfastened his collar, and turned on the small, handheld holoprojector which started autoplaying once it verified Parck's bioscan.

He wasn't lying to Stent about feeling exhausted, although probably for a very different reason than the Chiss had assumed. At any rate, he had no doubt that General Fel's hand-picked wingman would be able to operate a _Lambda_ shuttle on his own. On their way here, Parck had assumed the role of a co-pilot only to clear his mind before the painful exchange.

" _If you are seeing this message, it means I am dead and so is the clone on Nirauan,"_ the hologram said in Grand Admiral Thrawn's typical smooth, cultured voice, as if he was discussing a routine status report, not his own supposed death.

" _I do not know how many years have passed, but considering I recorded this message before leaving for the rendezvous with_ Chimaera _, I suspect there must have been an unforeseen complication which led to my ultimate demise. Either I have been assassinated by one of the many self-proclaimed warlords, or I have been defeated by the Rebellion in a suicide run into the heart of the enemy lines, which would seem most likely scenario. Nonetheless, it matters little. It means I have failed to re-unite the Core and that there is now a very different government in charge, the New Republic, or whatever it calls itself these days._ "

Here, the hologram paused.

" _Regardless, I beg you not to engage in further bloodshed merely to avenge my own death. The beings of the galaxy have chosen their preferred system of governance, and they will have to bear the consequences for their actions. Now you know the Far Outsiders are indeed coming, and if the central figurehead is unable to swiftly and ruthlessly deal with them in the only language they can speak,_ violence _, billions, no,_ trillions _of both combatants and non-combatants will die._ "

The hologram took a deep breath, and if it was anyone else, Parck would assumed was to steel himself.

" _Admiral Parck,_ Voss _, there is something you need to know, and it is one of my deepest regrets that I have never found the courage to tell you the truth personally."_

The expression on the alien face didn't change, not even a muscle twitch. Only the deep breath mere seconds before revealed the inner turmoil behind the mask made of pale blue marble.

" _I have never been truly exiled. I am, or rather I was, an undercover agent of the Chiss Ascendancy, whose mission was to infiltrate the Galactic Empire and make the most of its human resources, using them to fight the enemies which the Chiss Ascendancy could never attack openly because of their policy of not engaging in pre-emptive strikes."_

The hologram sighed and lowered his gaze, reminding Parck of a convicted criminal confessing to his crimes.

" _Commander Kres'ten'tarthi and the rest of the Phalanx are unaware of my secret mission, which makes for another deep regret of mine, since it means they have been reduced to mere pawns of the Chiss Ascendancy. Unlike me, they have truly exiled themselves when they decided to abandon the Chiss Expansionary Defense Force to follow in my footsteps."_

The hologram finally raised his eyes, staring blankly ahead, into the supposed eyes of the intended viewer.

" _I have never been the one you believed me to be, Voss. I have been merely trying my best to live up to the high standards you expected from me. You wanted to serve a leader worthy of your loyalty. You wanted to serve an empire worthy of its name. And I decided to give you exactly that: I presented you with Syndic Mitth'raw'nuruodo and with the Empire of the Hand."_

The pale blue lips marred in a smile empty of all amusement.

" _I even allowed you to call the Nirauan Fortress 'The Hand of Thrawn,' even though I never deserved such unconditional loyalty from anyone, least of all from you. However, perhaps it is finally time for you to know the truth."_

A muscle in the pale blue cheek twitched.

" _Now that I am dead, nothing is preventing you from contacting the Chiss Ascendancy and offering them a vow of silence in exchange for a general pardon so that the Chiss warriors may freely return home. Many of them left their families behind in order to follow a leader who had never been worthy of their loyalty in the first place."_

The hologram straightened to his full height and put his hands behind his back, and even though the glow of the Chiss eyes did not capture well on holo-recordings, to Parck it seemed as if there was a sudden spark in the glittering eyes, a spark of hope.

" _Perhaps it is still possible to salvage the situation somehow. I do not know. I lack the necessary information to make any reasonable prediction. However, perhaps now, after my death, it will be possible to open diplomatic relations with the Chiss Ascendancy without them having to worry about losing face. The Household Phalanx could be integrated into the Chiss Expansionary Defense Force. And perhaps, just perhaps, it will even be possible to convince the Chiss Ascendancy to help in the upcoming storm rather than stick their heads into the ice as usual in the foolish hope that the Far Outsiders will break their necks over the droid-using infidels."_

The hologram visibly swallowed.

" _I realize how presumptuous it sounds, but I would be immensely grateful if you treated it as the last wish of mine. Chiss Ascendancy is not evil. They are merely ridiculously short-sighted, and by accepting this mission, by believing I am the only one who can save my people from their own short-sightedness, I have become the most short-sighted Chiss of them all."_

The hologram shook his head.

" _You were my pawns in the game of dejarik I had been assigned to play, but please believe me that I have always cared for my pawns, and I would have never spent them needlessly."_

The hologram drew himself into a full military parade attention, raising his arm in a most perfunctory salute.

" _Farewell, Admiral Voss Parck, the true Hand of Thrawn. I hope now you understand the reasons for my silence and I hope that you will be able to find it in your human heart to forgive me one day. Syndic Mitth'raw'nuruodo … No, Thrawn out."_

The hologram dissolved into a hue of blue light until it finally disappeared, and Parck released a shallow breath, shaking his head at the absurdity.

"What a _moactan teel_ he was, thinking that I could ever resent him for being who he was."

Parck put the device back into his pocket, ignoring the strange, numb tightness in his chest. As he closed his eyes, the last thought that went through his head before the darkness swallowed him was that while Grand Admiral Thrawn may be dead, the show still must go on.

 **THE END**

* * *

" _We are all students of Grand Admiral Thrawn. They tell that his return was a deception, that he is dead. I say that's a lie. He will always be with us, as long as we can learn from his example."_

―Jagged Fel

* * *

MissKitsune08's note: _Moactan teel_ = fair haired, a fairly potent Cheunh insult which, in this context, would translate back to Galactic Basic as kriffing idiot.

There goes my headcanon as to how the Empire of the Hand integrated itself into the Imperial Remnant and into the Chiss Expansionary Defense Force. There is no Eli Vanto in Legends, instead there are Admiral Voss Parck and Assistant Syndic Soontir Fel.

Also, there goes my little theory as to why (Grand?) Admiral Pellaeon had been in favor of the Galactic Alliance against the Yuuzhan Vong ever since his first appearance in _Dark Tide II: Ruin_ , never doubting their potential to ravage the entire galaxy. In any case, information on the Yuuzhan Vong threat which Consul Leia Organa Solo had brought him was hardly breaking news to Pellaeon. Neither was the existence of the Empire of the Hand to the Moff Council:

" _As always I find your commentary and advice useful, my moffs, but I must remind you that I command Imperial space. (…) I wanted to inform all of you that I will be issuing a mobilization order that will activate all reservists and call some of those units into active duty._ _ **I will also issue a call to all of our covert forces, both within the Empire and without, to come to our aid. While some of you might have seen our hidden forces as ones that would someday enable us to take back the galaxy, the Yuuzhan Vong threat is one we must defeat.**_ _(…) If I fail, if you are made to play with your soldiers, I hope I do not live to see the results. Pellaeon out."_


End file.
